MIMO (multiple-input multiple-output) used in a wireless communication system is a scheme of increasing channel capacity and enhancing transceiving efficiency using multiple transmitting antennas and/or multiple receiving antennas. MIMO may be called a multi-antenna.
In MIMO environment, it may be unnecessary for data to be transmitted on a single antenna path. For instance, in MIMO environment, a receiver can reconfigure data by aggregating data fragments respectively received through a plurality of receiving antennas. Comparing a single antenna environment and an MIMO environment to each other, a data rate can be improved by maintaining a cell area size or coverage can be increased by maintaining a data rate, in MIMO environment.
A beamforming scheme in MIMO environment is widely used for a base station, a user equipment, a relay or the like. The beamforming scheme can be classified into a digital beamforming scheme or an analog beamforming scheme depending on whether a weight vector/matrix (or a precoding vector/matrix) is used for a baseband or an RF band. And, the digital beamforming scheme is applied to a precoding procedure of 3G/4G mobile communication system. For instance, in a current mobile communication system, a user equipment feds back a precoding matrix index (PMI) to a base station for a closed-loop based digital beamforming and the base station performs a beamforming based on the PMI.